Abbott's Nauru boat plan 'childish': Burke

Ehssan Veiszadeh, Nick Perry and Eoin Blackwell

The first group of asylum seekers are expected to be flown to Papua New Guinea on Wednesday under Australia's tough border policy.

Dr Otto Numan, chief executive of the only hospital near Manus Island detention centre, told AAP the group was due early on Wednesday.

This group, believed to be coming from Australia, will be the first arrivals since Prime Minister Kevin Rudd and his PNG counterpart, Peter O'Neill, agreed to expand asylum-seeker processing two weeks ago.

"I will be at the airport, checking the manifest to make sure they are who they are," Dr Numan said on Tuesday.

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In Australia, the federal opposition toughened its asylum seeker policy for a second time in a week, as it tries to catch up to Labor's hardline plan to banish boat arrivals to Papua New Guinea.

Opposition immigration spokesman Scott Morrison says the coalition will immediately erect a 2000-person tent city on Nauru to process asylum seekers should it be elected.

The five-year plan will see capacity on Nauru boosted to 5000.

Mr Morrison, who was in Nauru on Tuesday, said he would discuss with President Baron Waqa redeveloping a site for housing asylum seekers after their refugee applications had been assessed.

The coalition's strategy also includes turning back the boats, issuing temporary protection visas and building capacity at Manus Island in PNG.

Immigration Minister Tony Burke said expanding offshore processing in Nauru had merit and he'd raised a similar idea with the island nation's leaders last week.

But the opposition had been "grossly irresponsible" in rushing the policy out and putting a figure on the capacity for the proposed facility.